I Hate

- to wake up on a sunday afternoon and kill time alone in hostel while others are inching to peace in their post prandial slumber.
- to spend a weekend without my friends in town.
- when the soup is too hot to savour.
- when my mom affixes an adjective to everything she says.
- to endure a class in stupor.
- when i fancy a shirt and find my wallet empty.
- when i am obliged to listen to people who talk unceasingly about things that don't interest me.
- when my dad buys me COLLARED, HORIZONTAL striped t shirts.
- the hangover.
- to wear a helmet.
- when people remind me about the pace at which i am losing my hair.
- to get wet in rain when i am dressed in formals for college.
- when i am asked to account for my expenses.
- when i don't get to know what's happening back at home.
- when people condemn my riding skills.
- when people don't answer my calls/reply back immediately.
- when i get cleaned out for a duck in a cricket match.
- when someone calls me manjuNATH.
- when my name is spelt as manjuNATH on my certificates.
- when people don't value LIBERO.
- to wait for food when my taste buds are rearing to go.
- Sunny/Bobby Deol's movies.
- when my brother farts at me.
- when i don't get to swear at my brothers.
- when people overestimate my preparation for an examination.
- discussing the answers outside the exam hall.
- the way they celebrate birthdays in Pizza Hut (pure embarrassment).
- fake accents.
- to use a zebra crossing.
- delicate darlings.
- to end this list :)

Wenlockphobia

I would prefer touching a slimy lizard over being left deserted in some gloomy, creepy corner of the government wenlock hospital. Even after being posted several times for two consecutive years wenlock hospital is no lesser a maze to me than how it was when i first stepped into it fresh from anatomy and physiology. A senior surgery professor thought we deserved to be kicked on our butts for not having taken a case. he didn't mind at all to articulate his thoughts. What a great start! i had thought.
It usually takes me 5 to 6 days of attending clinics in each posting to be able to direct someone to the location of my unit's wards, with the help of landmarks like "the kitchen under the stairs" and "the stinking loo next to the bridge" that is. No wonder i am the butt of all jokes in the unit when it comes to geography of wenlock. It was just the second day of a posting and i had almost lost my way when i saw the familiar plump head nurse lugging a patient with his gauze handcuffs back to the ward. So relieved i was. I later learnt that the patient was brought the previous night to the hospital by the police.
Few times i even ventured into the student forsaken part of the hospital through a different entrance which i earlier thought was the portal to a sophisticated government office. Instinctively i would try not to appear jumpy and gamble my way through the corridors till i got to a familiar "landmark". Many a times i would have walked double the distance owing to my poor orientation of the place.
B comes after A, C comes after B, D comes after C. That is how it is everywhere right. But people here in wenlock seem to despise the rule. Why not rename the scattered units and wards in order, i always wonder. It won't take long before i incorporate the map of this huge, intimidating maze into a couple of cells of my cortex. After all nobody is a born genius. Everybody would have learnt their way through. May be i am a li'l slow when it comes to geography :)

Rebels in Revels

Mighty Mighty MIT... the "mighty" words from the ruthless and disrespectful crowd hit us like rotten tomatoes, raw eggs and withered footwear. we looked like a bunch of incongruous aliens bombarded with all the psyching one can think of. 'Combat it or fall prey'. it all depends on one's degree of vulnerability. fortunately we had four guys of which only three lively enough to cheer us. then there was our physical director who sits back and thinks criticizing his own players is the sole purpose of his presence. and he makes his presence felt so efficiently. great. some day i'm gonna tell him, "dude, losing a match is not the end of world". great ambience for playing the finals of the REVELS volleyball tournament, isn't it?

My schedule was all set for the day.

1. Attend the morning class on cardiology at 8.
2. ENT postings at 9:30.
3. Lunch followed by a nap.
4. Enjoy the few hours in the monumental TMA PAI convention center watching the inter class cultural fest.

Nothing bores life more than the never ending postings (i'm glad that i am through optho postings already). when i couldn't raise my threshold for tolerance any more i darted towards the sweet pretty pg instantly making up an excuse with a cautious optimism to get back to hostel. i knew she was sugary enough to let me go. my irresistable passion for volleyball couldn't prevent my excuse from being logical and justifiable and i set off with the rest of the team to manipal to play the revels cup.

As expected it was only the strong afternoon wind which kept the ball levitated in the air for more than the normal hang time and the green forbidden court just outside lush green flagged cricket ground welcoming us. so hostile! i thought. we had won the league matches the previous day (which i couldn't play because of some problem with my hand) and it was time for the big ties. an old foe, MCIS, who had lost to us in the inter mahe tournament just 4 months back wanted to get back at us with a vengeance. i could sense that the bruise on their ego was pretty fresh still. the match was a 5 setter. it took some time for us to adapt to the wind conditions. in compromise we had to lose the first set. talks of theories like the anti-swerve angle and the dip dodge technique from the opponent huddle were quite intimidating. the match went on to the deciding set and finally the oscillating pendulum of victory favoured us. i had palpitations and all the physical manifestations of the sympathetic over activity i can think of.

LIBERO. apart from the name nothing about it interests me. nothing at all. unfortunately i'm the libero of our team. worst of all a libero is not allowed to serve.

For some non obvious reasons i wanted to be in mangalore the next day. i was keen on playing the finals same day. after an hour of confusion the event managers and the sport directors compromised on continuing with the finals the same day. we had to play MIT in finals and their cynical looks with their cheering squad hit a cold wave of terror at us.

Thanks to the flawed application of common sense by the event managers, light was the major concern now as it was already dusk. the dimly lit flourascent lamps and the glitter due to their unreasonable positioning across the players on either sides of the court were making things more tough for us. slowly inching we snatched the first set. lost the second. the third was a cliffhanger. totally drenched in sweat, constantly wiping the sweat off the palms, heart racing to keep up with the adrenaline rush, vocal cords going on strike for over burdening. fall, die, do whatever it takes to win. winning was all that mattered then. even before i could believe we won we had won the set. the battle was over by then. the 4th set was a cake walk. and we had won!!! a sense of accomplishment. KMC M'lore wins 3 - 1 against MIT Manipal. hip hip hurray! hip hip hurray! hip hip hurray!!!

PS : Libero is a very important icon in the prospect of a team's victory ;-)

Sundays in hostels..

I'm not sure if Raymond’s feels like heaven, but a Sunday does. Specially when you can delightfully stop the alarm ignoring the snooze button royally and snuggle deeper into the blanket with a contented sigh.Wish i knew enough binary coding or programming or something about the chips to tweak the alarm in my phone to repeat only on weekdays than everyday. Nevertheless it does enough to serve the purpose of reinforcing the nervous system in alerting my senses and prevent seepage from the bladder. Be it my snoring roomie, the drillers or the marble polishing machines doing the renovation work (which is taking forever), nothing can trouble the alienated soul sailing away blissfully in sleep. Yet another day added to the saga without breakfast. All of us seem to have forgotten the word 'breakfast'. It's been months since we last had breakfast in the mess (the first day of college I suppose). There are exceptions, worshippers of the snooze button who crave for the gruesome combo of bread and the unsavory green liquid served on sunday mornings and not to slumber (people who don't need to snooze will not get my funda anyway).

Text your pals or ring up or do whatever it takes to book your chicken biriyani for lunch (the only dish to spice up your menu on a sunday). And team up with friends to make the grumpy manager the butt of all jokes or avenge with more than one helping of salad without his knowledge for the overpriced biriyani which comes with a single piece of chicken (of a miniature chicken i suppose) which with many layers of colorful masala is made to look herculean. And to add to it you're graciously served a cupful of semisolid custard (freely flowing at times) making another disagreeable combo. Like other acquired tastes, I’ve begun to heartily appreciate the combo. Hack around or chatter away the slothful afternoon or join the zombie party for a nirvana number 'rape me' in the second floor (without disturbing the exam going students in the third floor that is), or feel homey with a gripping book and soft music in the tranquil first floor, or join the TV buffs, or enjoy the threadbare argument (political or whatever) of the very few IAS aspirants crowding the newspaper room. Pro Schumi? or pro Alonso? Nerve yourself for the race day (as far as my knowledge spans all race days are sundays). The juniors are made to occupy the bleachers and each one of them gets a role in the race, obviously not to drive a V8 engine or fill fuel in the pits but to join the cheerleaders to add more color to the race.

Make Sunday an excuse to dine out with friends or to watch a movie in the Cineplex. Banter over the phone with friends, grab a glass of milk from the night mess and kill time with friends into the small hours. Call it night and crash...

beep.. beep.. beep.. beep.. .. snooze.............

Nebulous Library

Gone, are the days of fun. Gone, are the days of merriment. There was something that seemed scarier than TOSHIO now (toshio - the japanese ghostly character in a horror movie, which i happened to watch very recently), the EXAMS! There was a time when everything was fun. play your favourite game or sport after college, kill time with your folks bitching about everyone you knew under the sun, watch a box office hit late night in the newly built multiplex or a long ride to the beach in herds on a moonlit night.

Library seemed to be the only apt place to spend time now. I religiously entered the details in the register, though it's not mandatory (i feel not doing so is like a jinx to me, not letting me do anything productive, though i haven't been to the library many times to prove it. I am stupid sometimes), kept next to the scarp leading to the creepy library in the cellar. I feared of sciatica gazing into an empty chair and the desk (short enough to be called a table), which blurred into the background behind the pile of huge books (like the roulex of rbcs) in front of a burgundy burkhi (my codename for people wearing burkhas with reference to the color too), an inferiority feeling sunk deep in me. I chose a murky corner in the 8 x 16 grid library. Molecular genetics of malignant melanoma, lab diagnosis of SOME coxsackie virus, neural regulation of insulin secretion, all seemed to me like greek and latin. Learning judo or jujitsu or even fighting a griffin would be a lot easier. I wonder why they didn't teach us making speed balls (speed ball = cocaine + heroine, something i learnt in the forensic class), so that we could take one or two ROADS and lay flat, the thought brought a smile onto my lips.

The place gives you the feeling of being seated in a hermitage, where you can enjoy solitude even when people are around. BABY robbins looked herculean (i couldn't find a foetal in there). I started off with a topic and soon the side effects of the evening's volleyball practice seemed very obvious. I felt my head being cannoned by a toreador. the desk beckoned me like a cradle. I was keeping count of the number of yawns to keep my torso from crashing onto the desk. I wondered how i could feel so sleepy with a very bad headache (normally people with headache struggle to fall asleep). The Psychosomatic theory of medicine as explained by Norman Lewis in his Word Power now made sense to me. One's subconscious makes him / her susceptible to cold germs / causes headache, backache without any organic cause within the body.

A girl scampering next to me towards the exit (or the entrance, or whatever) to recieve a phone call brought some life to the dead atmosphere. Her footwear was slapping against the floor tiles creating a phonetic match with someone's claps as though to cheer her up to win the time trial to answer the call. Nothing much could be done than giving a curt look as she was a super senior. It's really funny to see people run as though the person on the other end is never gonna call again. Near the exit, a female who used the partition glass as a mirror to groom her frizzy mass of hair caught my attention. I couldn't help but smirk at her narcissistic concern.

I had already done enough justice to my watch and the wall clock. One of my friend came up to me remarking that i was too groggy and gave me his bike keys to get back to hostel. Being very pleased by his chivalry towards a guy, i digested the fact that i managed to read only two long pages. I thought i would have as well read so much sitting in the tv room and with better entertainment. It was my first day in library after a long time. Sallying back to hostel, i made a resolution to do nothing other than study in the library ( with my fingers crossed :) )